Weather Question

Glad you are home and safely on the ground. Now wasn't that fun? :D
 
kimberlyanne546 said:
Turbulence. Sucked. Clouds. Freaking out. Terrain. Learned more in the past 4 days about XCs than in all of my training.

GOODNIGHT!
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Well.... you will have this! Apparently you didn't freak out to the point of not being able to fly the airplane.

If you only fly with clear skies and light winds, you won't have many hours. Next time it will seem much easier. Glad it worked out in the end and you had a good time.

Gary
 
Gary said:
Well.... you will have this! Apparently you didn't freak out to the point of not being able to fly the airplane.

If you only fly with clear skies and light winds, you won't have many hours. Next time it will seem much easier. Glad it worked out in the end and you had a good time.

Gary
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:yeahthat:
 
I'll try to write tonight. Weather was "interesting" yesterday (clear skies my a$$ stupid METARS!!!) and when we landed it was on runway 11 with winds 160 gusting to 19 - yikes.

I have a problem, though - got all the photos from the trip (non-airborne portion) on my computer - from the BF's DSLR - however, on the flight to SLO he did NOT take any photos (we were busy navigating). I insisted that he take photos on the way home, especially because it was very pretty to be around those puffy white friggin turbulent clouds.

So here's the problem - got up at 5am today to pack (again) and drive the 1.5 hours home from his house. Realized that, last night, I forgot to offload (or even look at) what I'm hoping are wonderful airborne photos.

I'm not familiar with "drop box" and other sites - which one would allow him to upload, full size, all the photos (each is between 2-5MB and I'm sure he didn't take more than a few dozen)..... then allow me to download them onto my computer?

I won't see him until this weekend (or maybe even later) and I just don't want to wait.

Kimberly
 
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kimberlyanne546 said:
I'll try to write tonight. Weather was "interesting" yesterday (clear skies my a$$ stupid METARS!!!) and when we landed it was on runway 11 with winds 160 gusting to 19 - yikes.

I have a problem, though - got all the photos from the trip (non-airborne portion) on my computer - from the BF's DSLR - however, on the flight to SLO he did NOT take any photos (we were busy navigating). I insisted that he take photos on the way home, especially because it was very pretty to be around those puffy white friggin turbulent clouds.

So here's the problem - got up at 5am today to pack (again) and drive the 1.5 hours home from his house. Realized that, last night, I forgot to offload (or even look at) what I'm hoping are wonderful airborne photos.

I'm not familiar with "drop box" and other sites - which one would allow him to upload, full size, all the photos (each is between 2-5MB and I'm sure he didn't take more than a few dozen)..... then allow me to download them onto my computer?

I won't see him until this weekend (or maybe even later) and I just don't want to wait.

Kimberly
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A METAR is not a forecast, it is an actual observation valid at the time the observer looked out the window.

Bob Gardner
 
bobmrg said:
A METAR is not a forecast, it is an actual observation valid at the time the observer looked out the window.
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Many of them are automated, and the automation can be fooled. There are also inherent limitations of automated observation stations such as they only observe what they are programmed to observe.

I think I mentioned recently that there is a place where the sensors are frequently fooled when there is snowplowing in progress. I have seen this station report 1/4 mile visibility when it was actually more like 100 miles. I've also had the opposite happen where we are on the approach and I am thinking that we should have broken out and seen the airport by now...

Good job Kimberly. It sounds like you had a great learning experience!
 
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kimberlyanne546 said:
I'll try to write tonight. Weather was "interesting" yesterday (clear skies my a$$ stupid METARS!!!) and when we landed it was on runway 11 with winds 160 gusting to 19 - yikes.

I have a problem, though - got all the photos from the trip (non-airborne portion) on my computer - from the BF's DSLR - however, on the flight to SLO he did NOT take any photos (we were busy navigating). I insisted that he take photos on the way home, especially because it was very pretty to be around those puffy white friggin turbulent clouds.

So here's the problem - got up at 5am today to pack (again) and drive the 1.5 hours home from his house. Realized that, last night, I forgot to offload (or even look at) what I'm hoping are wonderful airborne photos.

I'm not familiar with "drop box" and other sites - which one would allow him to upload, full size, all the photos (each is between 2-5MB and I'm sure he didn't take more than a few dozen)..... then allow me to download them onto my computer?

I won't see him until this weekend (or maybe even later) and I just don't want to wait.

Kimberly
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Dropbox would work... you guys can either share a dropbox folder, or he can zip them up, put them in his Dropbox's Public folder, and right click the zip file, select DropBox > Copy Public Link, and email that link to you--then you can download them to your computer with that link.
 
TangoWhiskey said:
Dropbox would work... you guys can either share a dropbox folder, or he can zip them up, put them in his Dropbox's Public folder, and right click the zip file, select DropBox > Copy Public Link, and email that link to you--then you can download them to your computer with that link.
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Dropbox works great. However, you only get 2gb for free. Sounds like you would need more than this. You can, however, sync/delete/sync/delete, etc. with smaller files.

50gb costs $9.99 month and 100gb costs $19.99 month.
 
I never told you clear skies, I said bumpy with space around the clouds to fly.:p
 
Henning said:
I never told you clear skies, I said bumpy with space around the clouds to fly.:p
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You were right, it was bumpy. Then again, I haven't told the whole story. I hope to tonight or tomorrow. Pictures really help so I'll try getting him to do the drop box thing.

Kimberly
 
kimberlyanne546 said:
You were right, it was bumpy. Then again, I haven't told the whole story. I hope to tonight or tomorrow. Pictures really help so I'll try getting him to do the drop box thing.

Kimberly
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Just have him upload to Picassa or Flickr - then you can link directly to them.

On the down side, Picassa (dunno about Flickr) tries to "help" you and take over all the images on your computer, but it can be stopped.
 
kimberlyanne546 said:
You were right, it was bumpy. Then again, I haven't told the whole story. I hope to tonight or tomorrow. Pictures really help so I'll try getting him to do the drop box thing.

Kimberly
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If it was a scattered layer, you could have climbed above the clouds and had a smooth, easy ride. But, then would it have remained sScattered, or become Broken, then Overcast. That is the question. As you gain experience you will push this.
 
Anthony said:
If it was a scattered layer, you could have climbed above the clouds and had a smooth, easy ride. But, then would it have remained sScattered, or become Broken, then Overcast. That is the question. As you gain experience you will push this.
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Exactly. I couldn't tell which it was (it was near me and all like a gray line). I decided to go under it since it was higher than the altitude I had just climbed to of 4,500. But the first ones I "thought" I was going over, by the time I climbed up to my XC alt of 4500, were gone or so few and far between they were just a pretty picture. ATC was just starting to give me flight following and asked what I was doing. I told them I was climbing and circling to get some altitude before going on course and I told them there were clouds. Later I pretty much "fought" with ATC in the Bay Area but that's a whole other story.
 
Congratulations! I'm a relatively new pilot myself so my experience with my first long XC (Dallas to Santa FE) is fresh in my mind. Dealing with clouds, turbulence and terrain LOL, sounds all too familiar but fun in retrospect right? Did your BF enjoy? After mine I decided to get my IR. It certainly takes away the fear factor when flying VFR and dealing with changing weather.
 
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Bummer, Cloud Ahoy stopped working at Walnut Creek and didn't capture my whole flight. Odd. This is me trying to climb (I was going to do it en route but I didn't like all the clouds so I found a clear area and did circles).
 
To avoid the cloud layer (I could see the tops of the mountains, but not by much, and the closer I got to those damned layers the bumpier it became):

I found all the valleys I could (that were more or less along my planned route of many airport waypoints).

The most scary was before Hollister. After that it got better. I didn't like being surrounded by mountains and clouds.


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Very "interesting" bar they took us to (with the grandparents!)

These paintings are from the 1970's issues of Playboy, apparently they had a western theme one December and they made a mural of it:

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scottd said:
"If anyone is interested, please send me a PM with your e-mail address and I'll attempt to organize the webinar."


It'll likely be in the evening during the week. Not sure if it'll be this week or next.
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Scott, thanks for that awesome webinar. Unfortunately, I couldn't think of a question until after it was over.

My question: With all of the different aviation weather products available on the web, what would be a typical sequence of charts and forecast to check prior to an average XC flight, say about 100nm VFR?


Can you walk through what you'd be looking at prior to the flight. I'm just trying to get a feel for the best and most efficient way of weeding out what I don't really need as a VFR pilot. Don't want to waste a lot of time looking through stuff that's irrelevant to my flight.


Thanks
Low time pilot
 
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redtail said:
Scott, thanks for that awesome webinar.
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:yeahthat:
redtail said:
Unfortunately, I couldn't think of a question until after it was over.

My question: With all the different aviation weather products available on the web, what would be a typical sequence of charts and forecast to check prior to an average XC flight, say about 100nm VFR?


Can you walk through what you'd be looking at prior to the flight. I'm just trying to get a feel for the best and most efficient way of weeding out what I don't really need as a VFR pilot. Don't want to waste a lot of time looking through stuff that's irrelevant to my flight.


Thanks
Low time pilot
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I think he touched on that when he went through the QWXik brief. Though admittedly he didn't tailor it to a 100nm VFR flight.
 
I usually call for a standard briefing but I'd like to get better at using the online info and doing so in an effective manner. I know how to access most of the info like G-Airmets, etc... but sometimes I feel like I may be spending more time than necessary trying to figure out what I REALLY need.
 
redtail said:
I usually call for a standard briefing but I'd like to get better at using the online info and doing so in an effective manner. I know how to access most of the info like G-Airmets, etc... but sometimes I feel like I may be spending more time than necessary trying to figure out what I REALLY need.
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You may want to email him directly if he doesn't respond here.
 
jason said:
Bummer! I sent a PM but didn't get an invite...

Scott, let me know if you plan to do another one of these. I'd love to attend.
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Jason,

He told me that he was limited to 15 and those filled up quick - so perhaps you sent the PM after he already got 15 requests. He also asked for email addresses in the PMs so he could register everyone.

Kimberly

PS - I saw "free" training stuff on his site which I haven't had time to check out.
 
kimberlyanne546 said:
Jason,

He told me that he was limited to 15 and those filled up quick - so perhaps you sent the PM after he already got 15 requests. He also asked for email addresses in the PMs so he could register everyone.

Kimberly

PS - I saw "free" training stuff on his site which I haven't had time to check out.
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Just as a reminder, his website is http://avwxworkshops.com/
There's a lot of good information there, both free and subscription!
 
scottd said:
Kimberly,

There's quite a lot of free training on my website including free workshops, free e-Tips and all of my magazine articles.
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Thanks, Scott. I will check it out. I am trying to improve my understanding of weather. I have plenty of material in video and books but not enough time. I show my ass re my aviation weather "knowledge" on one of my YouTube videos.
 
kimberlyanne546 said:
http://www.cloudahoy.com/cgi-bin/fltShare.cgi?share=1jnagqRcXWKBWqbLqg1NV
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Thanks, Kimberly. That CloudAhoy is one neat app! Let me share one back with you. If you want to share your flight planning, do your flight plan on Skyvector. There will be a place to click for a link so that others can see the same flight plan, e.g.:

http://skyvector.com/?ll=37.0037765...6&plan=A.K2.KSBP:A.K2.KPRB:A.K2.KLVK:A.K2.O69

Remembering of course, that Skyvector is just for doodling, not for "real" flight planning :wink2: (uh-oh, there goes that "attitude" of mine, again.)
 
Also wanted to say thank you to Scott for putting on the webinar and answering my questions. I definately learned a few things and will probably sign up for a subscription to your site.

Andrew
 
scottd said:
You are welcome.



I worry about what you might be missing, not all the stuff you use that may be irrelevant. For example, I spend a lot of time studying the 500 mb constant pressure chart. There's a tremendous amount of useful information that often drives my decision to go or stay. 500 mb is roughly 18,000 feet.

I know your next question is, if I'm not planning to fly over 10,000 feet, why the heck do I need to look at the weather at 18,000 feet? Well, 500 mb is the "waistline" of the atmosphere. Half of the mass of the atmosphere is above 500 mb and the other half is below. Knowing what's happening at 500 mb and how it will evolve over time will often clue you in to what might happen near the surface. Yes, it demands some training to use constant pressure charts, but I can say for sure that it'l be the first chart you examine before every flight once you learn its magic.
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Ok thanks. I'll start getting familiar with the 500mb chart.
 
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redtail said:
Ok thanks. I start getting familiar with the 500mb chart.
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Me too. One thing I picked up today, but hadn't grasped from previous study, is that the constant pressure chart's lines connecting constant pressure points aren't all at the same altitude... the same pressure point in warmer air will be at a different height than that same pressure point in colder air. Can't visualize an isobaric chart the same way you would a topographic chart!
 
kimberlyanne546 said:
Turbulence. Sucked. Clouds. Freaking out. Terrain. Learned more in the past 4 days about XCs than in all of my training.
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Sounds familiar. :D
If you're like most of us, you probably feel a lot more confident now, but at the same time a lot more aware of how much you can still learn on any given flight. That's just how it works, and I think that weird mix of feelings is normal and healthy for any pilot.

Plan well but be ready to modify or abandon the plan, take some chances but have an "out", and remember you don't know it all (and never will), and you should continue to enjoy flying safely and actually get some utility out of it.
 
Scott, I also want to say a "Thank you" for a job well done. I appreciate it and plan on looking at your sight more. I caught most of what you were covering but was a teeny bit distracted as I was still doing some last minute studying for my IR check ride today.

Thanks again!! :D:yesnod::yesnod::yesnod:
 
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